With Republicans determined to block any movement on climate change in the Legislature, Gov. Kate Brown, as promised last year, decided to outflank them with a far-reaching use of her executive powers to achieve the same goals on a different path.
Brown signed an executive order Tuesday that establishes the same aggressive greenhouse gas emission reduction goals that were contemplated under Democrats’ controversial and now failed climate change policy, Senate Bill 1530. Namely, the state will seek to reduce emissions 45% below 1990 levels by 2035 and 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.
But Brown does not have the legal authority to set up the comprehensive, economy-wide cap and trade system that would have been established under that legislation. Instead, she is ordering an alphabet soup of state agencies to consider emissions reductions as a top priority in all their actions, and to use their regulatory tools to seek carbon reductions in specific sectors to move the state toward its goals.
“This executive order is extensive and thorough, taking the boldest actions available to lower greenhouse gas emissions under current state laws," Brown said in a statement. "As a state, we will pursue every option available under existing law to combat the effects of climate change and put Oregon on a path we can be proud to leave behind for our children.”
Brown said that while she still believes a carbon market would be the most effective way to reduce emissions, she does not have the executive authority to establish one. Instead, she said she was taking a sector-by-sector approach that would significantly reduce emissions while allowing the state’s economy to continue to grow.
“I’m keeping my commitment to Oregonians,” she said at a press conference.
Much depends on a lengthy rule-making process that will ensue, though the impact of the governor’s actions are likely to fall short of the cap and trade system that was proposed under Senate Bill 1530. It is surely a letdown for the national environmental groups that backed the bill in hopes that it would have a domino effect on carbon regulation in other states. Moreover, the governor’s order and the resulting rules are sure to face a legal challenge from opponents, as similar moves by Gov. Jay Inslee have in Washington.
Under the new approach, the state won’t auction emission allowances to companies or deploy the hundreds of millions of dollars in new revenue that would be generated to invest in climate change mitigation and adaptation programs. Backers of that program claimed that was the most efficient, market-based method to achieve the emission reductions.
Rather, the executive order relies on the Department of Environmental Quality to establish caps on emissions from transportation fuels, natural gas and industrial polluters that decline over time to meet the state goals. The department will regulate those emissions by permit, as it does other pollutants.
It’s unclear what percentage of the state’s overall greenhouse emissions would be covered under the governor’s plan. Kristen Sheeran, the governor’s carbon policy advisor, said limits on pollution in the transportation, industrial and natural gas sectors would cover north of 50% of the state’s greenhouse emissions, and that other programatic efforts would increase that percentage. The cap and trade program in Senate Bill 1530 would have regulated about 85 percent of the state’s greenhouse emissions.
At the outset, however, the governor’s plan includes none of the carve outs for various industry sectors and rural Oregonians that backers of Senate Bill 1530 had agreed to in order to make the bill more palatable to Republicans.
The governor’s plan “is going to be more expensive,” said Angus Duncan, the head of Oregon’s Global Warming Commission. “Once again, Republican legislators have done their constituents dirt by replacing a more cost effective and efficient way of reducing emissions... They’ve managed to include folks who otherwise who would have been excluded.”
“It’s another devilishly clever move on their part,” he added sardonically.
To get at emission reductions from cars and trucks, which are responsible for about one-third of greenhouse pollution in the state, the executive order doubles the state’s clean fuels standard. Originally passed in 2009, that program requires companies that import gasoline and diesel to lower emissions from the fuels they sell by 10% below 2015 levels by 2025, mostly by providing options such as ethanol and biodiesel, electricity, natural gas, biogas and propane. The standard will now require a decline of 20% by 2030, and 25% by 2035, giving Oregon the most ambitious clean fuel rules in the country.
In a related move, the order directs the Department of Transportation and the Department of Administrative Services to create a statewide plan to accelerate the deployment of charging stations across the state and electrify the state’s vehicle fleet. The agencies will also develop a tool to evaluate all future transportation spending through the lens of reducing greenhouse emissions.
The orders directs the state building codes division to increase energy efficiency standards for new buildings to achieve a 60% reduction in energy use by 2030. Meanwhile, the Department of Energy is directed to adopt appliance efficiency standards equal to the most stringent in the country.
The order provides clear direction to the Public Utility Commission to consider and reduce the risk associated with carbon emissions when reviewing utilities’ planned investments in power plants and transmission. It directs the commission to prioritize programs that rapidly decarbonize the sector, and encourages electric companies to invest in infrastructure that supports the electrification of transportation. That could include allowing utilities to build charging station networks and include the cost in rates.
At a meeting of the Legislature’s emergency board on Monday, lawmakers agreed to provide $5 million to support the implementation of the executive order. Republicans, back at the capitol for the first time in two weeks after their walkout, voted against the appropriation. Senate Minority Leader Herman Baertschiger, R-Grants Pass, said the governor’s order would inevitably end up being challenged in court.
Democrat and Republican leaders issued dueling statements Tuesday, alternately praising and condemning the governor’s order.
The Partnership for Oregon Communities, a coalition of employers and farmers opposed to the governor’s action and previous versions of the climate legislation, said Tuesday that Brown’s order was based on questionable legal authority, and handed over "unprecedented levels of power to unelected bureaucrats who will have the authority to regulate virtually every sector of our state’s economy.”
“Her administration has unfortunately decided to move forward on a path that will put taxpayers on the hook for significant litigation costs, with outcomes that are far from certain," the group said in a statement. "A similar effort in Washington state resulted in years of costly litigation, with limited results.”
Dustin Buehler, the governor’s general counsel, said in an interview that the order had been thoroughly vetted by lawyers at the Department of Justice. Brown committed Tuesday to publicly releasing that legal advice.
“My team and I worked very very closely with the Department of Justice to make sure this executive order is in full compliance with Oregon statutes and the Oregon constitution,” Brown said Tuesday. “We’re used to legal challenges. We have them on a regular basis.”
She added that there will be several months of a public rule-making process and that she didn’t think a legal challenge was likely until that was complete. “What I want to encourage is Oregonians to use their voices during that rul-emaking process,” she said. “It’s a public, transparent and inclusive process.”
The Republican walkout that stymied Senate Bill 1530, as well as last year version of the legislation, House Bill 2020, was a bitter disappointment for environmental groups. They had hoped to couple a new law in Oregon with California’s cap and trade system and begin building momentum for similar climate action in other western states.
The governor’s executive order falls short of that goal. The state won’t be establishing an emissions allowance trading market, or linking that system with California’s, for example. It’s not clear that Brown’s actions will have much immediate influence on other states, which was a major reason national environmental groups were engaged in the push for a cap and trade system in Oregon.
But the groups offered encouraging statements Tuesday.
“Oregonians have organized, advocated, worked and voted for years demanding our state take bold action to reduce climate pollution, improve our health, and transition to clean energy," Tera Hurst, executive director of Renew Oregon and a candidate for Portland City Council, said in a statement. “This action will hold large corporate polluters accountable for the pollution they create. We all have a responsibility to do our part and most of us do, now it’s time for large polluters to start doing theirs.”
Correction: Sen. Herman Baertschiger is the Senate Minority Leader. An earlier version of the story misidentified his title.
-- Ted Sickinger; tsickinger@oregonian.com; 503-221-8505; @tedsickinger
-- Staff writer Rob Davis contributed to this story.
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